The Attendance Was Robbed

This was one of Casey Stengel's favorite sayings when he was managing the Mets, and it was never truer than today.

First off, in the long list of things that people want to do to "improve" baseball, how about we dispose of the three-hour-seventeen-minute rain delay, which Yankees fans were subjected to today?

This had to be done, of course, because otherwise it might have meant Hal Steinbrenner at some point having to schedule a doubleheader and lose a whole game's attendance. Instead, he probably made out like a bandit on extra sales of beer and Rodentia Dogs to those poor chumps gullible enough to sit through this monstrosity.

Empires rose and fell, the continents shifted and reformed, entire NCAA brackets were decided.  And still, this putrid, unbearable afternoon of baseball dragged on.

Today's game was almost a classic in its awfulness, the sort of contest that, if repeated often enough, will kill baseball deader than a doornail with the next generation. Why in the name of Abner Doubleday would a young person want to drop the Xbox and go see that seven-hour nightmare?

Uh-boy. Where to start?

There was The Greatest Bullpen in the History of the World once again putting an anemic Yankees comeback out of reach...yet another game in which awful Yankees fielding—a ludicrously bad throw by ICS, a ball that The Gleyber misjudged—led to a key run by the opponent...insanely bad hitting...awful starting pitching—take your pick!

We got to see J.A. Happ arguing with his manager after Ma Boone decided to take mercy on those remaining fans and pull our big, free-agent acquisition following his dreadful, four-inning start today.

Great. We're not only going to get awful pitching. We're also going to have to put up with all sorts of Happ Crap to boot.

(Incidentally, Pat Corbin wasn't exactly a world-beater against the Mets today, but he did allow only two runs and got to where no Yankee starter is likely to reach this season:  the end of the sixth inning.)

Most of all, though, it's time for someone to admit, once and for all, that Cashman's "analytics" approach to the game is an utter failure, one that has reduced the Yankees' hitters to hopeless confusion.

Yankees hitters today struck out swinging at pitches that nearly scraped the ground (I'm looking at you, Sancho.). They struck out swinging at pitches that nearly hit their heads, as if fighting off bees (You know you did, Judge and Gleyber.). They struck out on three straight pitches none of which had more velocity than 75 mph (That would be you, Mr. Stanton.) They struck out on pitches that nearly hit their ankles, to end the game (Thank you, Troy.)

Every single Yankees hitter struck out today, save for Andujar and Gardy, who still has yet to get a hit on the season. Judge struck out four times, and looked as bad as he ever has at the plate. Stanton looked genuinely haunted. Luke Voit left an amazing seven guys on base.

The cause of much of their frustration was one John Means, a journeyman minor leaguer with a single, terrible major-league appearance last season behind him, who nonetheless shut down the Yanks for over three innings by throwing nothing by 74-mph change-ups at them.

The geniuses in the television booth assured us that this was due to Mr. Means' mastery of "the analytics."

They also informed us that, no matter how many straight, dying quail change-ups Means threw up there, the Yanks could not wait on them because you always have to be waiting on a fastball.

Right.

Means had a 35-41 record and a 3.83 ERA in the minors, and he wasn't much better today, surrendering five hits and a walk in his 3 1/3. But he did strike out Yankees whenever he needed to.

So did every other Oriole in sight. For the series, the Yanks left 35 men on base, and struck out 32 times against a pitching staff that would have trouble winning a Double-A pennant.

Even the buffoons in the booth were getting exasperated with the team's approach by the end. Not Brian Cashman, though, who I am sure will tell us it's still early.

I prefer Mr. Dylan (no, not Dylan Bundy):  It's not dark yet, but it's gettin' there.